PURPOSE: to investigate phonological acquisition in population of children with normal development. METHODS: the participants of this study were 240 children of both genders, between 3 and 8-year old. Data were analyzed with respect to age and gender. RESULTS: the results allow to conclude that at the age of 3 the phonemes /p/, /b/, /t/, /d/, /k/, /g/, /m/, and /n/ are already acquired and stabilized in the phonological system of the children. Also the phonemes /f/, /v/, /s/, /ʃ/, /z/, /ʒ/, /ʎ/ and /ɲ/ and the affricates [tʃ]e[dʒ] are already acquired at that age although we found a great production variability between children. The acquisition of the phoneme /ɾ/ occurs initially in simple onset (age 4) and afterwards in complex onset (age 5), the acquisition of the phoneme /l/ in simple onset occurs at age 3 and in complex onset at age 4 and the phoneme /R/ in simple onset is acquired at age of 3 and in final position at the age of 4. CONCLUSION: as for the total number of phonemes acquired, it can be concluded that from the age of 3 many children have a complete phonetic inventory, there is a great variability among children. As far as PCC and PCC-R is concerned, the mean percentage of correct consonants increases significantly and gradually while age increases. With regard to gender, not a single significant difference was found for any of the analyses performed in the current study.
Child; Speech; Language Development
